Kaze no Kama
The Kaze no Kama ("Scythe of the Wind"風 - Wiktionaryno - Wiktionarykama - Wiktionary) is a DEX-based dual wielding melee fighter with several distinguishing traits: * up to 18 attacks per round * very high AC (~76) * buffless strength (haste enables 18 attacks, although the Kaze is strong even without that) * high AB (~55) * high saves * high social skills * highly item dependent (nothing for low magic worlds - this is a serious disadvantage, btw.) Description Monk 11 / Fighter 12 / Invisible Blade 5 or Duelist 5/ Something else 2 The Kaze no Kama Build Discussion at the official nwn2-motb forum Build Discussion at the Epic Character Builders Part Deux guild forum focuses on hitting as often as possible per round while relying on damage from elemental equipment, Fighter feats and INT-bonus from the Combat Insight feat. It has the potential to strike 18 times in a single round with a good hit chance for most attacks, all of which can cause bleed damage after a successful sneak attack, provided you took a medium-sized race (i.e. no gnomes(halfings) and the Invisible Blade class instead of Duelist. The Kaze no Kama is not dependent on buffs or spells or spell-like-abilities despite being able to reach an AC well over 70 and being one of the highest melee damage dealers of all builds. Combine that with very high saves and you'll get a character that wades through the expansion campaign without breaking a sweat and without ever having to rest to refill spells, abilities or health.. Unusual for melee builds of that kind, the Kaze also sports pretty decent social skills (bluff, diplomacy, intimidate) despite having a very low charisma. There is no multiclassing XP-penalty and ECL 1 is neglegible. That's another story if you go for Deep Gnomes, of course.. It is playable from level 1 to 30, will progress reasonably fast and will reach the maximum level before the end of the campaign. Due to the low strength the first 6 levels will be a hard time for the Kaze ... but by then you should have aquired some enchanted kamas with additional damage. When playing a high level Kaze, you simply point it in a direction and watch many numbers appear over the future corpses. Apart from some buffs like Haste the Kaze will take care of almost any mob without tedious buffing procedures. Alone. When encountering enemies immune to most of the damage types that it's weapons have (frost,lightning, etc.), you can still feint and deliver sneak attacks, dealing stacking bleed damage (6 damage per hit over 3 rounds) if you chose an Invisible Blade build. ** Note - the current wiki page regarding Perfect Two Weapon Fighting contradicts itself regarding whether it is possible to get 9 attacks on each hand or not. It also states that the bonus flurry of blows attacks come at a dismally low attack bonus on the offhand. It would be great to resolve this contradiction, since the effectiveness of dual kamas is going to be far, far less than advertised if it is true that greater flurry gives the offhand only two extremely weak attacks. =Variants= By this time several variations spawned from the basic Kaze no Kama, each with their own advantages. Some are very good for making cool screenshots of the character sheet, some play through the campaign like a breeze and some are tweaked for PvP. All builds have 11 Monk and 12 Fighter levels in common - Monk for Greater Flurry and Fighter for Epic Weapon Specialization/Focus. Then the builds take either 5 levels of Invisible Blade or Duelist to take advantage of the INT AC bonus of those classes. The remaining two levels are freebies that nevertheless can heavily affect the playing style. Invisible Blade(5) These variants use the five iBlade levels for extra AC and the Bleeding Wounds feat. If you want to change the race, make sure you manage to get DEX 25 for perfect two-weapon fighting and your race is large. Otherwise you won't be able to deal bleeding damage since you are required to wield a weapon which is one size category smaller than yourself - in this case small-tiny. Sadly no tiny monk weapons have been implemented. Kaze no Kama - Divine Champion(2) The Air Genasi has some traits that make it ideal for the Kaze build and good playability in the campaign. If you consider playing from level 1 to 30, then the Air Genasi variants are the most rewarding choices. * The Air Genasi gets DEX+2, INT+2 bonuses, where INT is useful and DEX is critical. * Prefered Class: Fighter. This allows for zero XP penalties with efficient class progression. * WIS-2, CHA-2: The WIS-2 is inconvenient because it influences AC. Charisma penalty hurts dialogue options but can be countered by skills. And you will have enough points to spend on social skills. This build is optimized for accumulating fighting power (relatively) quickly: Weapon Specialization at 8, Improved Two-Weapon Fighting at 9, Greater Two-Weapon Fighting at 15 and Perfect Two-Weapon Fighting at 21. By level 27 you have all the major fighter feats tagged. It does pretty well in the campaign, giving you many skill points for combat and social skills. Pump Tumble for extra AC and Spellcraft for extra saves against spells. Depending on your preference, either put points in Diplomacy or Intimidate. You'll get high levels in two social skills. Bluff also increases your chance to Feint, but I doubt you'll encounter enemies strong enough to make that necessary. Final skill values (attribute modifications not included): Bluff(32),Diplomacy(32),Spellcraft(15),Spot(23),Taunt(3),Tumble(30) The Armor Skin feat can be replaced with something you deem more useful, e.g. Great Dexterity or Skill Focus:Bluff or whatever. Drow Fury - Paladin(2) The Drow Fury uses two levels of Paladin instead of Divine Champion, sacrificing one feat in exchange for even higher saves due to Divine Grace. Check out the seperate Drow_Fury page for details. Kaze no Kage Kama - Shadowdancer(2) This variant of the Kaze no Kama focuses on being unfair in addition to being overwhelming. The two levels of Shadowdancer add Hide in plain sight and Uncanny Dodge to your large selection of feats. Hide in shadows, siddle up to your victim, start the fight with feint or expose weakness and shred his hide with lots of bleeding wounds. Hide and repeat. Or just stand there and continue shredding. The drow attributes are ideal for this build, since the +2 boost to intelligence provide the much needed skillpoints necessary for hide and sneak. The charisma boost is actually combat relevant, because higher charisma means higher bluff, which in turn raises your feint skill. If you also wear Finch's Fine Hat (+8 Bluff skill bonus and other stuff), you'll be able to feint with a high probability even in duels, preparing your opponent for sneak attacks and thus bleed damage. On the downside you have to spend two feats in order to meet the requirements for the Shadowdancer class. When compared to the base Kaze no Kama, you have three feats less - in this case I dropped Armor Skin and Luck of Heroes and Blind Fight. If you don't want to skip on either one of those you might want to consider ditching Expose Weakness instead. Final base skills: Bluff(33), Diplomacy(20), Hide(33), Move Silently(33), Spellcraft(15), Spot(30), Tumble(30) Kaze No Maboroshi no Kama - Warlock(2) Phantasmal Scythe of the Wind or Illusive Scythe of the Wind This is a Kaze optimized for using the feint feat. It can reach a bluff skill of 60 with optimum equipment. Even against an opponent with BAB 30 and maximized spot skill of 33, feinting still has a 38% chance of success. The two warlock levels provide two Invocations: Beguiling Influence and Dark One's Own Luck. One raises your bluff skill by 6, the other raises all your saves by an amount equal to your charisma bonus, giving you effectively the same protection a paladin enjoys. Feinting sets up your opponent for sneak attacks in mid-combat, allowing you to apply lots of bleeding wounds - and this being a kaze build, lots means lots. Check the picture for some number crunching. You can either take Tiefling or Drow - both give you the same bluff skill value (Tiefling Bluff bonus vs Drow Charisma bonus). Alignment must be lawful evil due to warlock. Duelist(5) Kaze Duelists do - like Invisible Blades - get an AC bonus for high intelligence. They do not get the bleeding wounds ability, which significantly lowers their damage output against non-immune opponents. However, the feat prerequisites are slightly favorable: Dodge, Mobility, Weapon finesse This means you're not burdened with a useless weapon focus on Kukris. You also gain Improved reaction which serves as a kind of limited haste. Svirfneblin Kaze no Kama - Divine Champion(2) This is a power build, which means that is optimized for strong end-level performance. Campaign play might suffer. This build is optimized for defensive AND offensive power. The race choice of deep gnome adds a serious AC bonus to the already high AC, improves on saves, adds spell resistance and it still keeps it's ridiculous offensive power with an added perk: Improved reaction. SPOILER-------->This Kaze is truly independend and doesn't even need Safiya for her love and haste spell. If you ever considered the evil path you now have found the ideal recipient for the evilest item in the whole series.<--------SPOILER With epic equipment it's possible take on whole armies and minor gods. Unbuffed. Sample combat values when fully equipped and hasted (see notes for details): Main Hand Attack Bonus: +55/+55/+50/+50/+45/+40/+35/+30/+25/+20 Damage: 1-6 +12 +8(slashing) +5d6(fire) +5d6(cold) +5d6(lightning) Off Hand Attack Bonus: +50/+45/+40/+35/+30/+25/+20/+15 Damage: 1-6 +9 +8(slashing) +5d6(fire) +5d6(cold) +5d6(lightning) AC: 74 HP: 438 Fortitude: 29 Reflex: 31 Will: 25 And if you feel particulary unfair: there's always a cute cleric with buffing spells around ... Final skill values: Diplomacy(32),Taunt(33),Parry(5),Spellcraft(15),Spot(33),Tumble(30) The Great Dexterity feat can be exchanged for something else if you don't need Perfect Two-Weapon Fighting at level 25. Svirfneblin Kage Kaze no Kama - Shadowdancer(2) This is a power build, which means that is optimized for strong end-level performance. Campaign play might suffer. The Svirfneblin version of the Kage Kaze no Kame takes duelist instead of iBlade levels, which frees up two prerequisite feats. Since Shadowdancer and Duelist need the same two feats as prerequisites, you are free to put them to good use, e.g. Luck of Heroes or Blind Fight. This is basically the Svirfneblin Kaze no Kama with Shadowdancer levels instead of Divine Champion (or a Kage Kaze no Kama with Duelist levels instead of Invisible Blade - take your pick). It has several advantages and drawbacks when compared to either of them: Svirfneblin Kage Kaze no Kama versus Drow Kage Kaze no Kama Pro: * better AC * better saves * Blind Fight feat * Luck of Heroes feat * more HP Con: * slightly worse AB * no Bleeding Wound * no Feint feat * less skill points The disadvantages come in a neat package, though: since you can't cause bleeding, feint becomes less important (successful feint let's you sneak attack). Svirfneblin Kage Kaze no Kama versus Svirfneblin Kaze no Kama Pro: * Hide in plain sight * Uncanny Dodge feat Con: * one epic feat less (in this case Great Dexterity) * lower AB * lower saves * considerably worse social skills due to skill point distibution to Hide and Move Silently The social skill problem can be corrected by starting with INT 16 instead of WIS 16 which gives you enough points to bring one social skill to a very high level. If you plan on campaigning then I strongly suggest you go for brains. Diplomacy: 8(5), Hide: 33(42), Move Silently: 33(40), Spellcraft: 15(19), Spot: 33(37), Tumble: 33(40) Could Trade 2nd lvl of sd for another monk level? get the speed without losing the feat from a monk/ftr lvl switch. Duelist(7) Kaze no Kama Counterstriker ''Note: This build ignores the fact that Parry is royally bugged. Unless a patch corrects the skill, it is completely useless! --DirtyFinger 21:45, 5 March 2008 (UTC)'' The Tale of Hiro and Takeshi Two halflings dressed like peasants encountered each other at opposite sides of a bridge. "Stand aside," the one named Hiro said. "I intend to pass this bridge." '' ''The halfling named Takeshi bristled. "Who are you to speak to me in such a manner, peasant dog? You stand aside. You clearly do not know who you are dealing with." Hiro's eyes blazed. "I am Nakamura Hiro, master of the Two Blades That Flap Like Cranes' Wings style of fighting. Stand aside or meet my wrath." His hands blurred, and almost like magic, each held a kama that crackled with power. Just as quickly, a pair of kamas appeared in Takeshi's hands. "I am Murozono Takeshi, master of the Two Blades That Spin Like a Wild Geisha's Fan style of fighting. You stand aside, stinking dog s**t, or you shall fall this day." "One of us will fall," Hiro said, "but it will not be me." The two halflings locked eyes, and each assumed a defensive stance. Their blades hung waiting like the beaks of ravens. Takeshi drew his lips tightly, and Hiro's brow furrowed with menace. Somewhere in the distance, cherry blossoms fell. The sun blazed at midday but neither halfling moved. Time trickled slowly. At sunset, the two halflings realized that they were equally matched. They put aside their kamas, bowed to each other, and walked away, neither of them crossing the bridge. --Elysius Parry mechanics discussion at the official nwn2 forum This is a variation which maximizes Parry while keeping the advantages of the Kaze, allowing you to switch between aggressive and defensive playstyle. With Elaborate Parry(+7), Improved Two-Weapon Defense(+4) and Gloves of Swordplay (+6) you can get an effective parry skill of 62. Improved Parry will further increase your chance to counter attack, effectively adding +5 parry for the purpose of calculating a riposte. If we assume that the parry skill is pitted against an attack with an AB of 55 (which is about the highest you can get without buffs), you have a 74% chance of counterattacking with a Riposte at your highest AB. And since subsequent attacks will have an even lower AB, your chances to riposte will go up and up. If fighting against itself, it should parry about 14-16 attacks and riposte 10-12 times. Note that you can't flurry while parrying, so only 12 parries will be without penalty. Result: The duelist makes less attacks, but those have a higher chance to hit. And why a halfling ? Free Feat and DEX+2 ! Kaze no Kama Duelist Falconhurst created the first version of the Kaze no Kama Duelist - M(11),F(12),Dls(7). with the goal of maximizing AC by getting two more levels of duelist and combining it with the Deep Gnome race. Now that I think about it, it's a rather inefficient way to raise AC, since you need +4 INT to gain +2 AC. You could just put 4 points in WIS or DEX and have the same result. The only thing in favor or raising INT would be the extra +2 damage due to combat insight. Other Variations The Kaze type builds are pretty reliant on dexterity, so the most useful race choices are those with a DEX-bonus. When considering classes, there is not much room to deviate from the core build (monk11/fighter12/iblade5 or duelist5) that guarantees high AB,AC,saves and damage. Races *''Tieflings'' give even better stats than the air genasi. The only drawback is the prefered class of rogue, which forces one to alternate Monk/Fighter levels like in the non-fighter progression table or suffer XP-penalties. *''Drows'' give the best stat increases plus spell resistance in exchange for ECL 2 and a low constitution. Best combined with 2 Paladin levels due to (relatively) high charisma. Very powerful. Note: The Drow Kaze no Kama is practically identical with the Drow Fury build, which inspired some changes to the original Kaze. *''Deep gnomes'' have a forbidding ECL 3 and unfavorable stats. All Small Kazes suffer -1 attack bonus (+1 size, -2 weapon size) and can't deal bleed damage since Kamas are not small weapons in a gnomes hand. The attribute penalties are pretty hefty, too. But: The STR-2 and CHA-4 penalties are not combat relevant in the end, while the DEX+2 and WIS+2 are. Bleed damage is ineffective most of the time anyway, since damage resistance completely cancels bleed damage anyway and most of the tougher enemies are damage resistant. And the other advantages are enormous: +1 AC(size), +4 AC(race), spell resistance, +1 AB(size), +2 saving throws and a nice invisibility spell for extra concealment. Best match for Divine Champion 2. *''Strongheart halflings'' are not bad either thanks to the extra feat and no crippling disadvantages. And they have no ECL, making them reach the epic levels really fast. To avoid xp-penalties, you have to alternate Monk/Fighter levels, which prevents you from reaching greater flurry early. And it looks absolutely cute when a pint-sized runt runs into an army and rips it to pieces. ^_^ *''Yuan-Ti Purebloods'' (I am not the original creator of this page, but I was surprised to find this missing). I think this race, introduced in Storm of Zehir, works very well for this build. You get +2 Dex, Int, and Cha. You also get Blind Fight for free as well as a natural armor bonus of +1, and the racial spell resistance is great because it continues to increase over time(while the monk SR does not). There is a +2 level adjustment, but I think that is negligible. Race comparison For a XP-penalty free progression for races other than preferred-fighter races, see the non-fighter-races progression table. Depending on your starting DEX score, PTWF can be taken earlier. Classes A short explanation of the class and level choices: Monk 11: * Level 11 for Greater Flurry Feat Fighter 12: * Level 12 for Greater Weapon Specialization. Prerequisite for Epic Weapon Specialization. Invisible Blade 5: * Level 5 for Unfettered Defense (total AC+5), Bleeding Wound 3, Feint Mastery These three classes build the basis for the build, which leaves two extra levels to choose from. Divine Champion 2: * Level 2 for +1 saves and one bonus feat. Best choice for non-evil low CHA races, because the DC save bonus is level dependend. Paladin 2: * Level 2 for +1 saves for each charisma bonus point. Items should be able to provide CHA+8. Choosing Paladin will cause XP-penalties for level 30. Best choice for drows. For a Paladin build, check out the Drow Fury. Blackguard 2: * Level 2 for +1 saves for each charisma bonus point. Best choice for evil drows. Wizard 1: * One level of wizard gains you the True Strike spell, which can be applied to hit very high AC builds (>70). Apparently true strike lasts one round instead of one attack, so all of your 18 attacks this round will benefit from this short buff. Very useful if you anticipate strongly buffed opponents and just happen to have a Kama with on-hit-dispell properties or vorpal effects... Monk 13: * Gets you the Diamond Soul feat. Only useful if you don't already have racial spell resistance (Drow/Deep Gnome). Notes Without decent equipment the Kaze no Kama is rather unimpressive. While you get more attacks than the character sheet can display (no kidding, it says "Not applicable"), and you are guaranteed to hit quite often, the basic damage output is rather low if compared to an equally unequipped Power Ranger. But since enchanting is made pretty easy in MOTB and the in-game items are heavily enchanted, too, you are left with a melee character, that profits way more from attribute-boosting items than any other build: * gain AC+1 (+5 max) for every INT+2 (Unfettered Defense) * gain AC+1 for every DEX+2 (normal) * gain AC+1 for every WIS+2 (monk AC bonus) * gain main-hand damage+1 for every INT+2 or STR+2, whichever bonus is higher (Combat Insight) * gain off-hand damage+1 for every INT+4 or STR+4, whichever bonus is higher (Combat Insight) * gain the usual hitpoints for every CON+2 Note that Combat Insight should normally require you to have INT 19. It's possibly a bug, but works fine right now. Attack Bonus (Deep Gnome Power Build): Without any magic items and mundane Kamas: AC: 36 Main Hand Attack Bonus: +37/+37/+32/+27/+22/+17/+12/ Damage: 1-6 +8 Off Hand Attack Bonus: +37/+37/+32/+27/+22/+17/+12 Damage: 1-6 +7 Without any magic items and Greater Flurry: AC: 36 Main Hand Attack Bonus: +37/+37/+32/+27/+22/+17/+12/+41/+41 Damage: 1-6 +8 Off Hand Attack Bonus: +37/+32/+27/+22/+17/+12/+7/+2 Damage: 1-6 +7 Without any magic items and Greater Flurry and haste: AC: 37 Main Hand Attack Bonus: +38/+38/+38/+33/+28/+23/+18/+13/+42/+42 Damage: 1-6 +8 Off Hand Attack Bonus: +38/+33/+28/+23/+18/+13/+8/+3 Damage: 1-6 +7 Epic Equipment Examples: Without any magic items and Greater Flurry and haste and two Kama+8: AC: 37 Main Hand Attack Bonus: +46/+46/+46/+41/+36/+31/+26/+21/+50/+50 Damage: 1-6 +8 +8 Off Hand Attack Bonus: +46/+41/+36/+31/+26/+21/+16/+11 Damage: 1-6 +7 +8 With +8-to-all-attributes gear (although DEX/WIS/INT is sufficient for this calculation) and Greater Flurry and haste and two Kama+8: AC: 48 Main Hand Attack Bonus: +50/+50/+45/+40/+35/+30/+25/+20/+55/+55 Damage: 1-6 +12 +8 Off Hand Attack Bonus: +50/+45/+40/+35/+30/+25/+20/+15 Damage: 1-6 +9 +8 To protect yourself, wear Boots of the Sun Soul +5, Amulet of Natural Armor +5 and selfmade cloak and robe or bracers with AC+8. Result: AC: 74 =Equipment= Items you'll definetly want are the Boots of the Sun Soul +5 and the Amulet of Natural Armor +5. The others are interchangeable. With epic levels you can put up to 4 enchantments on each item, but you should refrain from do so, until the items enchantments are maxed out: It's not possible to overwrite a lesser enchantment with a stronger one if the item already has 4 enchantments. The recipies below usually require a character level of 30. For a good list of all recipies check out the Thieves Guild Homepage. Boots of the Sun Soul +5 Special Properties: *AC +5 (Dodge) *DEX+3 Enchantable with: *DEX+8 (3*Pristine Air, Cat's Grace) *CON+8/+9 (3*Pristine Water,Bears Endurance or 3*Pristine Spirit, Mallerate Spirit) Amulet of Natural Armor +5 Special Properties: *AC +5 (Natural) Enchantable with: *WIS+9 (3*Pristine Spirit, Malleate Spirit) *All Saving Throws +7 (3*Pristine Power, Superior Resistance) Nymph Cloak +X (better yet would be a cloak with one good property, like freedom of movement) Special Properties: *CHA +X Enchantable with: *CHA+9 (3*Pristine Spirit, Malleate Spirit) *AC+8 (Deflection) (3*Pristine Power, Tortoise Shell) Headband of Intellect +X (or even better, the Eyes of the Coven) Special Properties: *INT+X Enchantable with: *INT+8 (3*Pristine Spirit, Malleate Spirit) *Will Save +9 (3*Pristine Power, Owl's Wisdom) *STR+8 (3*Pristine Earth, Bull's Strength) Imaskari Bracers of Immortality (or anything else with 2 nice properties) Special Properties: *CON+8 *Regeneration +3 Enchantable with: *AC+8 (Armor) (3*Pristine Power,Mage Armor) =References= Author: DirtyFinger category:Character builds category:Melee Character builds category:Dual Wielding Character builds category:Power Builds